Apichatpong returning to Cannes fest

Added to the festival’s official selection late on Thursday, “Cemetery of Splendour” is the latest work from the maker of “Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives”, which won Cannes’ top-prize, the Palme d’Or, in 2010.
“Cemetery of Splendour” will compete in the festival’s Un Certain Regard category, a programme that runs parallel to the main Palme d’Or race and highlights “original and different” works.
The film, also called “Rak Ti Khon Kaen”, is about a lonely middle-aged housewife who tends to a soldier with a mysterious sleeping sickness. She then “falls into a hallucination that triggers strange dreams, phantoms and romance”, according to the filmmaker’s website, KickTheMach-ine.com.
This will be Apichatpong’s fourth time at the Cannes Film Festival. In 2002, he entered with “Blissfully Yours” (“Sud Sanaeha”), which won the Un Certain Regard top prize. He returned in 2004, entering the main race with “Tropical Malady” (“Sud Pralad”), and winning the Jury Prize from a panel headed by Hollywood director Quentin Tarantino. His historic Palme d’Or success in 2010 came from a jury headed by Tim Burton.
“Cemetery of Splendour” was among a trio of Asian titles added to the Un Certain Regard category. Filipino director Brillante Mendoza, who won the best director at Cannes in 2009 for “Kinatay”, will be there with “Taklub”, a film about Typhoon Yolanda.